Backing Up Your Data. If you clicked "yes" to the automatic back-up option during your initial installation, ODB will automatically back up your database to your hard drive at the beginning of each month. Note: ODB will allow you to automatically back up data weekly or daily. Need to document this. Mention USB Key.

At backup time, ODB provides you with an option to also save the database file to a diskette - a standard diskette holds about 2600 records - or to a Zip or Network drive if it will not fit on a disk. We highly recommend that you back up your data to an external location, not only your hard drive.

You can also back up the database manually, so that after a period of high data entry, or as part of a weekly or daily routine, you can save additional copies of your data. To access the manual backup feature, click on the help icon in the upper right corner of the ODB main screen, and choose Backup Database from the menu.

Reverting to a Back Up. In case you ever need to restore your database from a backup, it may help to get assistance from someone very familiar with computers.

1. First, open up the folder named "Backup" within the folder where your current copy of the ODB program was installed. (This is usually the "OC" folder within "Program Files" within the "C:" drive.)

2. In this folder you should see all your monthly auto-backups (named odbdata01, odbdata02, for the January and February backups) as well as any manual backups (named odbdata0205, for a backup made on Feb. 5).

3. Copy the most recent backup file to the location where you keep the master copy of your database.

4. Finally (when ODB is not running), change the name of the main database and then rename the backup copy to match the old name of the main database.